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Your address label indicates the current status of your subs at 21 April 2010. Annual Subscriptions (R50 per household for 2010) became due in January 2010.

NEWSLETTER FOR 3rd QUARTER 2010.

OUR SPEAKER FOR THE QGM ON AUGUST 26, 2010 is…. MR. CALVIN MOJAPELO.

Title of Presentation: “Table Mountain National ParkAnd Volunteers”
Since September 2008, Calvin has been the People & Conservation Manager at TMNP, with responsibilities which include constituency building, community relations and also the Manager of Volunteers. He is passionate about Education & Training, as well as supporting young leaders to mentor and support them in achieving their dreams. Before joining TMNP, he worked for about 10 years in different roles with students across the four main Universities in Cape Town.He enjoys working across cultures in different communities and focuses on being a people developer, valuing the building of relationships/networks.

Licensing and Driver’s Testing Centre.

It’s getting there, but since the mention in our 2nd Quarter Newsletter and an original hope for an April opening, we still need to apply some of our special well-practiced Fish Hoek brand of patience.
We are assured that there has been good progress on the refitting of the old Plans Office at the Civic Centre to accommodate the offices for the new facility. Right now it stands ready to open for business.

We further hear that it remains only for the National Dept. of Transport to respond to the positive recommendation from the Western Cape Dept. of Transport that all is ready for the kick off. This reportedly involves some commissioning formalities such as being Government Gazetted and certain other legalities.
With all of this, there is no firm “Official Opening Date” at this time, but we detect a hope on the local grapevine that it is not unrealistic to think that the date of 1st October 2010, or before, could be a vision for it all to happen.
There are extra spin-off benefits to this most welcome development:
– The areas available for parking at the Civic Centre and Moth Hall will be expanded and upgraded, including improved lighting.
– 47 parking bays are planned for the Moth Hall, with a pedestrian walkway on the perimeter of the area and safer access for vehicles. A regular security guard is also envisioned.
– There will be extra parking spaces made available in the Civic Centre area, which will be achieved by utilizing the existing grassed pedestrian area more efficiently.
However, it isn’t going to happen all at once. There are questions as to the cost of completing the Moth Hall parking as originally planned. At the very least however, improved lighting can be hoped for there.
And of course there is the BIG plus factor that it will no longer be necessary to schlep up the line to Ottery or Hillstar to achieve legal status as a licensed driver and regular road user.

HAVE CITY PLANNERS LOST THE PLOT?
Poor Communications Between CITY of CAPETOWN and CIVIC BODIES.
There are grave concerns among the Civic Associations regarding the current trends that Planning is taking in the City.
A recent General Meeting of the Far South Peninsula Community Forum (FSPCF) addressed the vast number of complaints which now exist regarding the direction in which City Planning is heading.
There appears to be an apparent consensus between key politicians and planning officials to discourage public interaction with development proposals and planning applications.
The City officials appear to have lost sight of their purpose – they do not see themselves as elected governors, public servants and service providers but rather as a ruling elite who alone know what is good for the City and its people.
The FSPCF feels that the Centralized Unicity is a disaster for Cape Town – it is cumbersome, expensive, wasteful and inefficient. Relationships with the community are carried out via “arms-length” surveys and engagement with the public via the elected Ward Councillors is rejected.

The Greater Cape Town Civic Alliance (GCTCA), of which the FHVRRA is a member, is a network of the 140 or so active Civic Associations in Cape Town. Civic bodies play an important role in land use planning in representing citizens’ views, monitoring development and decision making and generally helping to ensure top quality service delivery. There are skilled and experienced members, many of whom put in long hours of voluntary service. The GCTCA has for some years been in dialogue with City of Cape Town officials and politicians in attempts to correct what are believed to be serious flaws and shortcomings in the City’s land use management and decision making processes.
A large dossier of problem cases has been assembled from all geographical and socio-economic sectors of Cape Town. The GCTCA is keen to co-operate with the City in seeking solutions to the many problems that residents, property owners and developers are experiencing. The following is a “brief” summary of the classes of problems that appear to be most prevalent:
-Lack of Notification of plans submitted.
-Sub-standard service delivery – no formal
Quality Management Systems.
-Critical decisions taken by remote officials.
-Unnecessary delays – planners overworked.
-Personal preferences on plans by officials.
-Bad planning decisions on many
developments.
-Subversion of the planning process, disregard
of historical character.
-Favouring developers’ interests over that of
local communities.
-Approval of blatantly illegal or fraudulent
plans.
-Deliberate dependence on plans which will
change during construction.
-Buildings finished but not matching plans.
-Failure to issue “Stop Work” or “Demolition
Orders”.
-Developers and Architects subverting
planning processes.
-Debate stifled on questionable proposals –
Civics excluded from debate.
-Inadequate legislation – laws needed to
impose appropriate penalties.
Source: GCTCA

FALSE BAY HOSPITAL.…Calling All Gardeners. Volunteering is big in our Valley. Numerous activities such as for example the Silvermine Wetlands, gardens on public spaces off Highway, Emergency Control Centre, Jager’s Walk, Nerina Elderly Care and church charity groups are all supported with the help of volunteers who willingly donate their time to such worthwhile causes.
The flower gardens at False Bay Hospital have been lovingly revived and maintained by volunteer hands over the past eight years.
The current contingent of regular and dedicated gardeners comprises only three individuals, who are very keen to enlist the help of anyone with available time to work with them on this project.

No special skills are needed, just loads of enthusiasm – the benefits of gardening are myriad and well documented. Your participation will be met with grateful thanks and you will be ensuring that this wonderful effort continues to be sustained, giving much pleasure to all visitors to the Hospital as well as the patients and staff.
Your offer of assistance would be welcomed by JANDY JAQUES on Telephone 021 782 7556.

A DATE FOR YOUR DIARY:
OUR 4th QUARTER GENERAL MEETING IS ON THURSDAY NOVEMBER 25th AT 19h30 at the
FISH HOEK CIVIC CENTRE

TOWN AND AROUND.…a quick round-up of what’s going on in our valley….

Jager’s Walk: Generally, the ever-popular walk has now been restored to a good standard, with the exception of some loose ends. Particularly, there has been some seepage from the bank which makes the walkway slippery and unsafe. The responsible Environmental Officer has made recommendations to address the problem.
The question of replacing the railings, or not, remains a very sore point.
-Fish Hoek people appear to want them.
-Council do not appear to want to listen.
Feelings are high on this one; already one person [unknown] has inserted three stainless steel brackets/handles on the rocks.

Fish Hoek / Simonstown rail service, no sign of any signs:
There are no visible direction signs at Fish Hoek station to indicate that passengers wanting to travel to Simon’s Town from Fish Hoek can get there by bus. Security staff say that “announcements are made periodically”. The buses themselves also have no signs to say where they are headed or coming from.
Curiouser and curiouser! And…. the tourists?
A driver of one of the buses was recently arrested for possession of mandrax and another driver was fined R2000 for speeding and overtaking a police vehicle on a solid white
line (!)
The Simon’s Town Civic Association
(STCA) will be holding its Mid-Year General Meeting on Wednesday 18 August, 2010 at 19h30 in the Phoenix Hall in Glencairn.
Mr. Louis Beukes, Senior Manager
Infrastructure, Metrorail Western Cape, will tell about plans for the future of the railway line between Fish Hoek and Simon’s Town.

Fish Hoek Station and surrounds: The Bayside Bazaar area is still in need of tidying up. There is a live electric cable which has been cut, taped with “danger” tape and left as it is. A hole in the sidewalk which has been “blocked over” by a cement bin. However, with credit where it is due, the station forecourt is looking less of an eyesore now that the paving has been completed.

Bins on the Beach:
There have been complaints from residents who were unhappy about the small number of bins and alleged poor state of the beach between the “lighthouse” and the yacht
club, plus the amount of kelp piled on to the sand dunes.
A committee member recently met with a complainant to inspect the area, but it had
by then already been cleaned and was in good shape at the time. There were a number of bins at either end but none in the middle.
The kelp is stacked purposely on the dunes to help prevent erosion.
A further request was made for more bins on the beach. Some were actually installed, but were removed 24 hours later. Head of the City’s Cleansing Department, Ms. Clare McKinnon, says there are enough bins.

More cleansing Issues: Shoprite and Environs/Water Leaks in the Main Road: There is a vagrant and beggar problem in the Shoprite car park. The Shoprite Manager has permitted Mach 1 security staff to enter the property to remove them.
Water leaking from the air conditioners from the flats above Shoprite building needs to be attended to by the owner of the building.
The flats also appear to be responsible for the waste bins being a litter problem after vagrants have scattered their contents. These bins ideally should be barricaded to prevent easy access.
There is also concern regarding the butchery at the Shoprite store. There needs to be a process in place to minimize solid matter being hosed into the stormwater system when the butchery is cleaned.
There will be follow-up on cleansing procedures at the butchery at the soonest opportunity.
There is also a problem of sewer pipes leaking into False Bay from the Clovelly and Kalk Bay areas, with a high pollution count. No one seems to be able to pinpoint the source of these problems at this stage.

Municipal Ward Delimitation:
The final picture as gazetted in May 2010 is that the FHVRRA area will be divided into 3 wards (with a Councillor each) as follows:
(1)Fish Hoek mountainside (approx. south of Recreation Road and south of Kommetjie Road from 10th Avenue), grouped with Simon’s Town, Da Gama Park and Ocean View – Ward 61.
(2)Fish Hoek valley and Clovelly grouped with Kalk Bay, St James, “older Muizenberg”, Lakeside and Marina da Gama – Ward 64.
(3)Sun Valley grouped with Noordhoek, Kommetjie, Masiphumelele, Sunnydale and Capri – Ward 69.
No further objections beyond those previously made were lodged by the FSPCF and the FHVRRA.